You are contradicting yourself. If the Bible is the LITERAL WORD of God, there is NO ROOM for INTERPRETATION. It is ALWAYS to be taken literally! Thus, the literal word of cutting off your hand is NOT to be understood as hyperbole. It is God's LITERAL WORD! I would understand that most Protestants do not consider the Scipture as God's literal word, but God speaking THROUGH the writers to convy His inerrant teachings to mankind. Thus, God's inerrant writings are subject to interpretation by the Church, changing meaning over time in some cases (since God speaks to men of different ages and cultures). Thus, taking oaths or money from loans, or polygamy are not indefinite literal commands.
I would respectfully disagree that the books of the Bible expound and verify the oral teachings (overall), because so many of them aren't there. I continue to ask "why is that?"
Partially answered above. God's inerrant word comes to us through Scripture. But God taught man to teach other men the proper WAY of interpretating Scriptures - for men of today. An authoritative body, put together and empowered by Christ, IS the sign of authority of Christ on earth, not the Bible. A book CANNOT interpret itself! The Church treasured the writings of the Apostles - who had long ago died. They compiled the writings they left. Found within the Scriptures is all we need to know for salvation - BUT, it is not always clearly and explicitly laid out. For example - prayers to saints in heaven to intercede for us. It is based on Scripture and was obviously a teaching of the Apostles. To cull out these "hidden" meanings in Scripture requires a Body of Teaching first. Then, we can point to Scripture and say, "yes, it is within Scriptures dictates and is allowed and expected that we DO ask for the prayers of other Christians, including those who have physically died".
This same authoritative Body teaches that the Eucharist is the Real Presence of Christ. Can you find a time before 1000 AD where this was not taught? No. It is Scriptural and it was believed by Christians everywhere. But a Protestant, reading the Scriptures (like the Ethiopian of Acts) without help of the Church, comes up with the spiritual-only interpretation.
The problem, then, is that you accept the authority of Scriptures, but not the same body who wrote and collated it - identifying and verifying it, that the Bible is, INDEED, the Word of God. How can a fallible group of men determine what are infallible writings and infallibly compile them into one book? Without making ONE mistake? Recall that Jesus left an authoritative group of men, not a book.
I also reiterate that no man had any kind of a 'yup' or 'nope' vote in what went into the Bible. It was rigged from the beginning
Men throughout the Church could not agree on 2 Peter, for example, and whether it was inspired. This went on past 250 AD! God made His "decision" through men. That's the way God works. If the Bible came to us like you say, it would have fell from the sky, a la Koran, and there would have been NO dispute. Here is a table that shows that the Church from 100 AD did not automatically "recognize" what was Scripture and what wasn't!:
http://www.ntcanon.org/table.shtml
this site has a lot of good info and quotes on the development of the NT into one book.
Regards
No. The dictionary also supports me, as in "reproduced word for word : EXACT, VERBATIM". Assume that we have a conversation that I tape record, and you use an allegory to illustrate a point. I then go to another friend to explain this teaching. I stumble through the story that you told, so my friend asks me "what were his (your) literal words"? I play the tape and say "those were Joe's literal words". No one would then claim that the story must be taken literally.
I don't believe that any interpretation from man was needed to write the actual words of the scriptures. Interpretation comes later from the Spirit through fallible men. You must assume that God's word includes the interpretations of men (whom I call "the scribes"), which may be why you appear to have a much lower regard for scripture than Protestants.
A book CANNOT interpret itself! The Church treasured the writings of the Apostles - who had long ago died. They compiled the writings they left. Found within the Scriptures is all we need to know for salvation - BUT, it is not always clearly and explicitly laid out.
Why not, especially when you start with wonderful premises such as "God doesn't lie" and "God doesn't contradict Himself"? Within that framework, we can certainly make interpretations based on other scripture. I agree that not everything is explicitly laid out, but on some things, good Christians may disagree. I believe the core issues are not like that for most Protestants, they are reasonably clear. I suppose this means that Protestants must believe to a higher degree that Christianity is a revealed faith.
The problem, then, is that you accept the authority of Scriptures, but not the same body who wrote and collated it - identifying and verifying it, that the Bible is, INDEED, the Word of God. How can a fallible group of men determine what are infallible writings and infallibly compile them into one book? Without making ONE mistake?
Yes, exactly! How could such men do that? The answer is that they could not. Instead, God did it all. Men were used for physical labor, but contributed nothing of substance. All the glory for God's holy word goes to God, not men.
Men throughout the Church could not agree on 2 Peter, for example, and whether it was inspired. This went on past 250 AD! God made His "decision" through men. That's the way God works. If the Bible came to us like you say, it would have fell from the sky, a la Koran, and there would have been NO dispute.
Partially answered above. I only wanted to add that I dispute that there would have been no dispute. :) Wasn't Mohammed's style to say "believe this teaching, or I'll kill you"? Since we don't do that, I see it as being perfectly natural for fallible men, in different stages of sanctification, to greatly disagree on what is to be the perfect truth made into the Bible. I would expect it. That's why I believe that God took no chances and made it all happen Himself.